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Very little of the public gets their information directly from scientists or the publications they write. Instead, most of us rely on accounts in the media, which means reporters play a key role in highlighting and filtering science for the public. And—through embargoed material, press releases, and personal appeals—journals and institutions vie for press attention as a route to capturing the public's imagination.
This system doesn't always work smoothly. Just this year, we've seen a university promote a crazed theory of everything and researchers and journals combine to rewrite the history of science in order to promote their new results. But these unfortunate events are relatively minor compared to a completely cynical manipulation of the press that happened last week.
In this case, the offenders appear to be the scientists themselves. After getting a study published that raised questions about the safety of genetically modified food (GMOs), the researchers provided advanced copies to the press only if they signed an agreement that meant they could not consult outside experts. A live press conference and the first wave of press appeared before outside experts could weigh in—and many of them found the study to be seriously flawed.
Science journalism and the embargo system
Each week, reporters around the world get a jump on the scientific community. Nearly a week before the new editions of major journals are released, the press gets a chance to download many of the papers that will appear within them. That access is predicated on a simple agreement: nobody runs any news stories about the contents until after a date and time set by the journal. This embargo system is why key scientific findings tend to appear everywhere at the same time, with hundreds of similar stories published within minutes of each other.
When it works well, the embargo system provides a valuable sanity check on media hype. While preparing their stories, reporters are allowed to share the papers with relevant experts and scientists with contrary opinions, who can warn the public about the possibility of over-interpretations or shaky data (provided they, too, agree not to publicize the results early).
This system has its flaws—embargoes can be capricious or get broken, and the sources can be selective about who they allow to access the papers. But it can provide what's essentially an additional level of peer review before the results are set out before the public.
Manipulating the system
The important checks provided by that system have now been systematically undermined by a group of French researchers, primarily at the University of Caen. The researchers managed to get a paper published in the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology. Their paper examined the long-term viability of rats fed a diet supplemented with either the herbicide Roundup or a crop engineered to tolerate high levels of Roundup. In their study, the researchers claim to have found that both the pesticide and the GMO crop reduced the lifespan of the rats and caused a high incidence of tumors.
People with relevant expertise, when given a chance to look at the study, found significant and systematic flaws with both the experimental approach and the data. Presumably, this is precisely why these scientists went out of their way to avoid giving them the chance to look.
At the blog Embargo Watch, Ivan Oransky has tracked how the researchers controlled access to their paper. Any journalist that wanted to receive an advance copy was required to sign a non-disclosure agreement before receiving one. That agreement prohibited the outlet from sharing the results with any outside experts before the embargo lifted. In other words, if a press outlet wanted to be one of the first to cover the story, it would have to run the story without having any experts sanity check the paper.
The manipulation didn't end there. The embargo lifted during a live press conference from the researchers, hosted in London in cooperation with the Sustainable Food Trust. The SFT conveniently had a press release prepared; a release claiming that the research was "supported by independent research organization, CRIIGEN." However, this neglected to note that the paper's lead author, Eric Seralini, is on the CRIIGEN board.
The researchers got exactly what they'd intended. The first coverage was largely uncritical. Slashdot linked to the press release when mentioning the story, while the first coverage from Reuters didn't address any scientific questions whatsoever (although it did raise some cautions about the researchers themselves).
Problems with the research
We looked into the study immediately after it began appearing in a variety of outlets. While we didn't have the sort of expertise in toxicology needed to critique some of the details, a few things stood out. First, there appeared to be no dose sensitivity for either Roundup or the level of GMO food provided—they saw the same effects at any of the doses they tested. In addition, the GMO food produced the exact same effects as the Roundup, something the authors didn't provide a reasonable explanation for.
But these problems were only the beginning. As more critical reports began to appear and scientist/bloggers looked at the results, huge issues were made clear. The authors used a strain of rats that is prone to tumors late in life. Every single experimental condition was compared to a single control group of only 10 rats, and some of the experimental groups were actually healthier than the controls. The authors didn't use a standard statistical analysis to determine whether any of the experimental groups had significantly different health problems. And so on.
The experts who weighed in were dismissive. One called the work "a statistical fishing trip" while another said the lack of proper controls meant "these results are of no value." One report quoted a scientist at UC Davis as saying, "There is very little scientific credibility to this paper. The flaws in the test are just incredible to me."
However, by this point, the promotion of the paper already had its desired effect. Both the European Union and French governments were asking their food safety organizations to look into the results, which may have implications for France's attempt to ban GM crops.
Ethical failures all around
If the previous examples we've covered have been about scientists who have gone too far in promoting their work, at least in those cases the goal appears to have been publicity. In this case, the researchers clearly seem to be focused on achieving political ends, namely a ban on the use of genetically modified crops. All indications are that they have performed sloppy science, presented it as indicating something it hasn't, and then knowingly manipulated the press coverage of their work. All in order to ensure the paper had an oversized impact in the public sphere.
In that, apparently, they were unknowingly aided by the peer reviewers who allowed the article to be published. Food and Chemical Toxicology is a small, specialized journal, but there's little reason that its reviewers shouldn't have expected a basic statistical analysis of these results. (We've reached out to the Editor-in-Chief of the journal, but haven't received a response at publication time).
But the use of a nondisclosure agreement to limit press coverage should have set off alarm bells within the press. As Ivan Oransky put it in his Embargo Watch report, this threatens to turn reporters into little more than stenographers, copying down only what researchers want them to say, and performing no independent evaluations. Journalist Carl Zimmer, on his blog, calls out the AFP and Reuters (Oransky works for a different group within Reuters) for having agreed to the conditions in the first place. He writes, "This is a rancid, corrupt way to report about science."
In this case, however, the press wasn't reporting about science at all. It was simply being used as a tool for political ends.


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NCAA Tournament: A roundup of Friday's Sweet Sixteen games
ARLINGTON, Texas — Trey Burke never doubted he could lead Michigan to its deepest NCAA tournament run since the Fab Five era.
Not after a scoreless first half. Not when the Wolverines trailed top-seeded Kansas by 14 with less than 7 minutes left — or by 5 with 21 seconds left.
And definitely not when he got the ball in his hands and the seconds draining away.
Burke scored all 23 of his points in the second half and overtime, including a long, tying 3-pointer in the final moments of regulation as Michigan rallied to beat Kansas 87-85 in the South Regional semifinals Friday night.
"We never lost faith out there," Burke said. "We stuck it out together."
Ben McLemore had 20 points to lead the Jayhawks (31-6), who looked to be on their way to a third straight regional final before Michigan's improbable rally. Instead, they became the third No. 1 seed to fall in this tournament, joining Gonzaga and Indiana.
"Well, this will certainly go down as one of the toughest games that obviously we've been a part of and I've been a part of," Kansas coach Bill Self said. "But props to Michigan for making all the plays late."
That's for sure.
Curry scored 29 points and the Blue Devils beat Michigan State 71-61 on Friday night to advance to the Midwest Regional final in the NCAA tournament.
"Seth was just at a different level than anyone else on the court offensively tonight," Krzyzewski said. "To get 29 points in a game like this against a good team is just incredible."
If No. 2 seed Duke (30-5) beats top-seeded Louisville (32-5) in Sunday's regional final, Krzyzewski would tie John Wooden's record with 12 Final Four trips.
Third-seeded Michigan State (27-9) just couldn't keep up with Curry and Duke's shooters. Keith Appling had 16 points for the Spartans, and Adreian Payne finished with 14.
Curry's sixth 3-pointer of the game broke a 38-38 tie early in the second half, sending Duke on a 9-0 run. It also matched the school record for most 3s in an NCAA tourney game, most recently accomplished by Jason Williams on March 22, 2001, against UCLA.
The Blue Devils never trailed again.
Rasheed Sulaimon had 16 points and Mason Plumlee finished with 14 for Duke.
Even a nasty cold can't stop Russ Smith.
With his teammates struggling with the virus he gave them and top-seeded Louisville facing its toughest test of the postseason, Russ put on his best show yet. He matched his career high of 31 points and the Cardinals proved they can win close games, too, beating Oregon 77-69 on Friday night.
"Without Russ Smith, we couldn't win," said Louisville coach Rick Pitino, who improved to 11-0 in the regional semifinals of the NCAA tournament.
Louisville (32-5) plays Duke on Sunday, the first time Pitino and Mike Krzyzewski have met in a regional final since Christian Laettner's shot in 1992.
Louisville has been nearly untouchable during its 13-game winning streak, beating opponents by an average of 17 points. And it looked as if this was going to be more of the same when Smith outscored Oregon 9-8 through the first 10 minutes.
But the 12th-seeded Ducks (28-9) made a game of it late.
After Louisville went up 66-48 with 9:01 left, Oregon made six straight field goals to close to 70-64 — the closest anyone's been to the Cardinals in weeks. But Kevin Ware scored on a layup and Chane Behanan threw down a monstrous dunk to put the game out of reach.
Ware finished with 11, topping his previous career best by one, and Gorgui Dieng had 10 points, nine rebounds and four blocked shots.
Mike Rosario had 15 points and Florida is going to an NCAA regional final for the third year in a row after a 62-50 victory over Florida Gulf Coast, the No. 15 seed whose improbable tournament journey ended just before midnight Friday.
Florida Gulf Coast, the high-flying team from "Dunk City" few people knew before this NCAA tourney, jumped out to an early 11-point lead against the SEC regular-season champs.
But the No. 3 seed Gators (29-7), with a roster filled with NCAA tourney experience, were just too strong and too good.
Michael Frazier made a pair of 3-pointer to start a 16-0 run late in the first half. That came in a 4½-minute span when the Eagles (26-11) had four turnovers and missed their only shot. They trailed the rest of the game.
The Gators play Michigan in the South Regional final at Cowboys Stadium on Sunday. They are trying to get to their first NCAA Final Four since consecutive national championships in 2006 and 2007.

subset: commoncrawl


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Drake Bennett had a superb article, "The surprising ways that metaphors shape your world," in Sunday's Boston Globe. Here are some excerpts.
* * *
[W]hether they're being deployed by poets, politicians, football coaches, or realtors, metaphors are primarily thought of as tools for talking and writing–out of inspiration or out of laziness, we distill emotions and thoughts into the language of the tangible world. We use metaphors to make sense to one another.
Now, however, a new group of people has started to take an intense interest in metaphors: psychologists. Drawing on philosophy and linguistics, cognitive scientists have begun to see the basic metaphors that we use all the time not just as turns of phrase, but as keys to the structure of thought. By taking these everyday metaphors as literally as possible, psychologists are upending traditional ideas of how we learn, reason, and make sense of the world around us. The result has been a torrent of research testing the links between metaphors and their physical roots . . . . Researchers have sought to determine whether the temperature of an object in someone's hands determines how "warm" or "cold" he considers a person he meets, whether the heft of a held object affects how "weighty" people consider topics they are presented with, or whether people think of the powerful as physically more elevated than the less powerful.
What they have found is that, in fact, we do. Metaphors aren't just how we talk and write, they're how we think. At some level, we actually do seem to understand temperament as a form of temperature, and we expect people's personalities to behave accordingly. What's more, without our body's instinctive sense for temperature–or position, texture, size, shape, or weight–abstract concepts like kindness and power, difficulty and purpose, and intimacy and importance would simply not make any sense to us. . . .
* * *
"The abstract way we think is really grounded in the concrete, bodily world much more than we thought," says [Situationist Contributor] John Bargh, a psychology professor at Yale and leading researcher in this realm.
* * *
George Lakoff, a professor of linguistics at the University of California at Berkeley, and Mark Johnson, a philosophy professor at the University of Oregon, see human thought as metaphor-driven. But, in the two greatly influential books they have co-written on the topic, "Metaphors We Live By" in 1980 and "Philosophy in the Flesh" in 1999, Lakoff and Johnson focus on the deadest of dead metaphors, the ones that don't even rise to the level of cliche. They call them "primary metaphors," and they group them into categories like "affection is warmth," "important is big," "difficulties are burdens," "similarity is closeness," "purposes are destinations," and even "categories are containers."
Rather than so much clutter standing in the way of true understanding, to Lakoff and Johnson these metaphors are markers of the roots of thought itself. Lakoff and Johnson's larger argument is that abstract thought would be meaningless without bodily experience. And primary metaphors, in their ubiquity (in English and other languages) and their physicality, are some of their most powerful evidence for this.
* * *
Inspired by this argument, psychologists have begun to make their way, experiment by experiment, through the catalog of primary metaphors, altering one side of the metaphorical equation to see how it changes the other.
Bargh at Yale, along with Lawrence Williams, now at the University of Colorado, did studies in which subjects were casually asked to hold a cup of either iced or hot coffee, not knowing it was part of the study, then a few minutes later asked to rate the personality of a person who was described to them. The hot coffee group, it turned out, consistently described a warmer person–rating them as happier, more generous, more sociable, good-natured, and more caring–than the iced coffee group. The effect seems to run the other way, too: In a paper published last year, Chen-Bo Zhong and Geoffrey J. Leonardelli of the University of Toronto found that people asked to recall a time when they were ostracized gave lower estimates of room temperature than those who recalled a social inclusion experience. [See video below, summarizing warm/cold study.]
* * *
* * *
Similar results have proliferated in recent years. . . . Thomas Schubert, has also done work suggesting that the fact that we associate power and elevation ("your highness," "friends in high places") means we actually unconsciously look upward when we think about power. Bargh and Josh Ackerman at MIT's Sloan School of Business, in work that has yet to be published, have done studies in which subjects, after handling sandpaper-covered puzzle pieces, were less likely to describe a social situation as having gone smoothly. Casasanto has done work in which people who were told to move marbles from a lower tray up to a higher one while recounting a story told happier stories than people moving them down.
Several studies have explored the metaphorical connection between cleanliness and moral purity. . . .
To the extent that metaphors reveal how we think, they also suggest ways that physical manipulation might be used to shape our thought. In essence, that is what much metaphor research entails. And while psychologists have thus far been primarily interested in using such manipulations simply to tease out an observable effect, there's no reason that they couldn't be put to other uses as well, by marketers, architects, teachers, parents, and litigators, among others.
* * *
We recommend reading Drake's entire piece, here. To read a sample of related Situationist posts, see "Bargh and Baumeister and the Free Will Debate — Part I & Part II" "The Situation of Body Temperature," "Social Psychology and the Unconscious: The Automaticity of Higher Processes," "Unclean Hands," "The Body Has a Mind of its Own," "Ideology Shaping Situation, or Vice Versa?," "The Situation of Snacking," "The Situation of Imitation and Mimickry," and "The (Unconscious) Situation of our Consciousness – Part I, Part II, Part III, & Part IV."


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Argo opens this weekend. Ben Affleck has been selling it for weeks, and very, very well. He's smiling for the paps, he's taking his daughters out, he's hitting parked cars and leaving considerate notes for the owner, and he covers the new issue of The Hollywood Reporter.
It's a perfect interview. He is humble, he is grateful, he sounds mature, he is self-deprecating, and ...he tells his wife he loves her on the phone in front of a journalist.
Oh! And he agrees to talk about JLo!
Come ON.
That's pretty good, Ben Affleck. That's pretty good.
In service of what?
He wants the movie to open strong, of course. And then there's Oscar in 4 months. So what he's really doing is he's working over the voters. And the voters, they can't resist this story. This is a story about a guy who was down and out. He was DONE. It was over. But he found himself, and he rededicated himself to the work, the magic of moviemaking!, and look what happened?
These are the dreams Hollywood was built on.
That's the message this article punches you in the face with over and over again.
Ben doesn't mind if you bring up Gigli. Ben doesn't mind if you talk about how he kissed JLo's ass on a yacht in a video. Ben doesn't mind if you introduce Armageddon into the conversation. Because this is a COMEBACK. Who can resist a comeback (even when it's, really, not that applicable because he officially came back after Gone Baby Gone and The Town)?
But I do love this strategy: exploit the sh-t time in your life as much as possible, squeeze the sh-t out of that situation in your favour for as long as they'll let you if there's an Oscar nomination waiting for you at the end of it. Just don't peak too soon. You want to save some good moves for later. Campaign season is long.
In the meantime, let's go over what he said about JLo:
"We don't have the kind of relationship where she relies on me for advice but we do have the kind of relationship where there'll be an e-mail saying, 'Oh, your movie looks great.' I remember when she got American Idol. I said: 'This was really smart. Good luck.' I touch base. I respect her. I like her. She's put up with some stuff that was unfair in her life, and I'm really pleased to see her successful."
So...they email. And he means to imply that they don't email all the time which means that they probably email more than he means to let on. I always imagine that Ben and JLo were/are one of those couples that shouldn't be together but can't stay apart. That if they don't self-discipline and restrict contact, it won't be long before it gets like this again.
But you know, his confirmation that they still communicate only opens the door to ask her about their communication. That's what I would do if I were interviewing her:
"So, Ben recently said that you email him when his movies come out and that he congratulated you on your American Idol gig..."
And that can go a few ways:
Either she'll just pick up on that sentence and finish it herself and offer up the soundbite, or you give her a gentle nudge, like -
"Did you see Argo? People are talking about him going all the way the Oscars...!"
And that'll yield three or four more soundbites and you're set for at least a week or two of headlines. About a couple that hasn't been together for almost a decade.
Click here to read the full THR article.
Attached - Affleck last night with George Clooney and the Argo cast at the New York screening.


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Gain Confidence by Learning Not to Fear Falling
You can't reach your potential in climbing if you are terrified of falling, and the key to confidence is for you and your partner to master dynamic-belaying technique. If you are still using the belay method that you learned as a beginner—standing still at the base and locking the rope off—then there is no guarantee that your leader will have a safe, comfortable fall. The "catch" may be too static and the climber may hit the wall too hard.
You can't reach your potential in climbing if you are terrified of falling, and the key to confidence is for you and your partner to master dynamic-belaying technique. If you are still using the belay method that you learned as a beginner—standing still at the base and locking the rope off—then there is no guarantee that your leader will have a safe, comfortable fall. The "catch" may be too static and the climber may hit the wall too hard.
Dynamic belaying refers to a method where you slightly lengthen the fall in the interest of softening the catch by introducing a small and strategic amount of slack at the exact moment of the fall. The method requires fast reactions and should only be practiced by experienced belayers. This article will provide key tips but it is not a comprehensive guide. Seek further advice if you are unsure, and remember that you practice at your own risk.
The Right Device
First up, if you use a belay plate (as opposed to an auto-locking device), then you need to consider the diameter of your rope and the weight differences between you and your partner. Some modern plates provide the option of low-friction or high-friction modes (commonly with V grooves for extra braking force). When using thicker ropes (approximately 10.2mm to 11mm in diameter) or when the belayer is notably heavier (by at least 20 pounds) than the climber, then opt for low friction. If the ropes are skinny (9mm to 10.1mm) and the belayer is lighter or similar in weight, then go for higher friction.
That said, you can give a good soft catch with any belay device. It's more important to pick a device you're comfortable using and master it.
One caveat: Very light belayers will be pulled off the ground when catching a heavier climber's fall. If the first bolt is low, the belayer can be pulled right to that quickdraw, and if the belayer is using an auto-locking device, the locking mechanism can jam into the carabiner and press open. In these instances, it is better for a lighter belayer to use a plate device, or tie into a ground anchor (see below).
Regardless of weight differences, the belayer should always stand in close to the base of the route until the leader clips the third bolt. If you stand too far back for the first few clips, there's a high chance that you will be pulled in during a fall. You can slam into the wall and the leader could hit the ground.
Always aim to give slack quickly to allow the leader to make a drag-free clip. This requires focus, solid belaying technique, a well-designed belay device and a kink-free, well-flaked rope. Be wary of narrow belay plates that are prone to jamming when you pay out slack fast.
The Method
Heavier belayer—lighter climber (or similar weights)
Once the climber has reached the third bolt, the belayer can step back a few paces (no more than 10 feet). There are two good reasons: first, the belayer can better monitor the action. Second, he/she can move in when paying out rope to provide an even more rapid delivery.
Always stand perpendicular to the route. If you stand to the side there is the risk of colliding awkwardly with the wall if the rope is loaded unexpectedly in a fall, and you could lose control of the rope. Be aware of any objects (trees, rocks, etc.) between you and the wall. Don't keep the rope too tight or too slack—it should arc gently out of the device, but not touch the ground.
When the climber falls, watch the rope: just as it begins to come tight onto the last clipped quickdraw, move forward and give a little hop into the air. Don't run, don't jump, just a little hop timed to coincide with the falling climber weighting the quickdraw. Be sure to keep hold of the brake end of the rope tightly and not let it slip through your hand.
Lighter belayer—heavier climber
With this scenario, the belayer always stands in close to the wall. If the route is steep, try standing with your back to the wall, as this will allow you to watch the climber and save your neck. If the weight differences are slight, then a light belayer may be pulled a short way off the ground but a small, well-timed hop may still be appropriate. If the weight differences are significant (75 to 100 pounds) then the belayer may want to clip into a ground anchor (a tree, for example). The anchor line should have a small amount of slack in it, to allow the belayer to be pulled up a short way (hence softening the fall) but not so far that he/she is sucked up to the first quickdraw.
Gear Tips
With so much to think about and coordinate, you will want to reduce all other unwanted distractions. Unless you check regularly, your belay carabiner can twist around and cross-load. Try using a belay carabiner with a "captive bar" to ensure that your belay biner never cross-loads.
Regular Practice
You can theorize as much as you like, but the only way to become confident is to practice. While dynamic belaying still offers the best belay method on vertical routes and slabs, only practice on overhanging lines.
Neil Gresham is one of Britain's best-known all-around climbers. Having repeated the notorious Indian Face (5.13 X) in North Wales and Equilibrium (5.14 R) on Peak District gritstone, he went on to make many hard first ascents in exotic destinations such as Brazil, Mongolia, Cuba, Vietnam, China and Colombia. He currently lists deep-water soloing as his favorite climbing style and is just back from an exploratory trip to Oman. Gresham is widely regarded as a pioneering climbing coach. He is the regular training columnist for Rock and Ice. See www.climbingmasterclass.com.


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|Holiday house Fränkische Schweiz (332579)
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Luring Apartment in Plankenstein near Forest
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WASHINGTON — The United States began building a case Friday that would pin the blame for the downing of the passenger jet over Ukraine on separatist forces supported by Russia, in a disaster that could dramatically escalate the crisis in Ukraine. President Barack Obama said one American was among the nearly 300 killed and called for an immediate cease-fire to allow for an unfettered investigation.
Evidence indicates that Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by a surface-to-air missile from an area controlled by Russian-backed separatists, Obama said at the White House. He warned that the incident showed the crisis in Ukraine won't be localized or contained to the region.
"This should snap everybody's heads to attention," Obama said.
He identified the U.S. citizen who was killed as Quinn Lucas Schansman. No other details were available on the passenger.
While cautioning that the exact circumstances of the crash were still being determined, Obama pointed his finger at Russia for providing support to separatists that he suggested enabled them to shoot down the plane. He said such an attack wouldn't be possible without sophisticated equipment and training — "and that is coming from Russia."
"Obviously, we're beginning to draw some conclusions given the nature of the shot that was fired," Obama said in a stern address at the White House. "There are only certain types of anti-aircraft missiles that can reach up 30,000 feet and shoot down a passenger jet."
Officials from the FBI and the National Transportation Safety Board were on their way to Ukraine to help determine what happened, Obama said. He warned that evidence must not be tampered with as a United Nations-backed investigation goes forward, and he said, "We will hold all its members, including Russia, to their word" in allowing access to the crash.
At the United Nations earlier Friday, U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power delivered an extraordinary speech rebuking Russia and noting that the U.S. could not rule out that Russian personnel had assisted separatists in firing a missile at the plane.
"Russia can end this war," Power said. "Russia must end this war."
The National Transportation Safety Board said it was sending a single investigator to Ukraine as part of a U.S. delegation to assist with the investigation.
The White House has taken the lead in forming the U.S. delegation, according to an official familiar with the effort. A command center has been set up at the State Department, where officials from agencies participating in the delegation gathered Friday morning for a briefing from the CIA on the political and military situation in Ukraine, the official said.
A second U.S. official said all available evidence, including satellite imagery, pointed to the plane being shot down by an SA-11 anti-aircraft missile fired from eastern Ukraine by Ukrainian separatist forces. The U.S. detected three discrete events associated with the shootdown, the official said: the launching of the missile from the Ukraine side of the border, the missile's impact with the plane, and the plane slamming into the ground.
Both officials insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss U.S. intelligence matters publicly by name.
The attack Thursday afternoon killed 298 people from nearly a dozen nations, including vacationers, students and a large contingent of scientists. At least 189 of the dead were from the Netherlands.
The plane was shot down in eastern, Ukraine, near the border with Russia, in an area where Moscow's support for pro-Russian separatists has alarmed the U.S. and its European allies. The incident occurred one day after Obama announced broader economic sanctions against Russia for its threatening moves in Ukraine.


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Randy Udall, Missing in Wind Rivers, Has Deep Mountain Roots
James Randall "Randy" Udall, 61, missing in the Wind Rivers of Wyoming this week, is part of two families prominent in political, academic and mountaineering circles.
James Randall "Randy" Udall, 61, is reported missing in the Wind Rivers of Wyoming this week after failing to return from a solo backpacking trip last Wednesday.
A former Outward Bound instructor, Udall is part of two families prominent in political, academic and mountaineering circles, and has been active in the mountains for decades. Lou Dawson of wildsnow.com notes that Randy has pioneered remote ski-mountaineering traverses in the Sierra and on Baffin Island.
"If anyone could survive some sort of problem in the backcountry it would be Randall, so we are optimistic," Dawson writes. "Nonetheless the clock is ticking. Many people have experience backcountry traveling in this area of the Wind River. If you do, apparently SAR could use your help in the ground search."
Udall, who signed in on June 20 for a solo backpacking trip from the Elkhart Park trailhead, in the Wind Rivers, was expected to return Wednesday, June 26. He has logged many backpacking visits to the area.
Udall and his wife, Leslie Emerson, of Carbondale, Colorado, are both former Outward Bound instructors, and one of their three children is an OBS instructor.
Calvin Lee, an attorney and climber from Glenwood Springs, Colorado, who knows Udall through their mutual environmental activism, last "ran into" Udall and Leslie out hiking at the top of the East Creek drainage above Redstone, Colorado. Lee notes, "I do know he is a bright and resourceful guy, so hopefully he is just waiting for a rescue or making his way out."
Randy Udall is one of the nation's leading environmentalists, the founder and former director of the Community Office for Resource Efficiency (CORE), which according to Global Public Media achieved the state's first solar-energy incentive program and the world's first Renewable Energy Mitigation Program. He has written extensively on environmental issues, and is a particular critic of the practice of hydraulic fracking.
Leslie Emerson, a former school principal and now director of the Roaring Fork School District Pre-Collegiate program, grew up spending time in the Tetons, where her father was a climbing ranger. Richard "Dick" Emerson was an admirably solid member of the American Everest Expedition of 1963, which put the first American on top of the mountain and pushed the first ascent of the formidable West Ridge (see feature in Rock and Ice no. 211, Click Here to access the digital edition). Dick Emerson supported the offshoot West Ridge effort, a visionary and very uncertain objective, and was a perceptive and fair voice in team discussions. Emerson's climbing partners and peers included Willi Unsoeld and Leigh Ortenberger, with whom, in 1953, he established a direct finish on the North Face of the Grand Teton. Tom Hornbein, who with Unsoeld ascended the West Ridge of Everest, was another longtime friend. Emerson was a professor of sociology at the University of Washington and a leading sociologist. The World of Sociology writes, "Richard M. Emerson influenced the study of social structure by introducing the theory of social exchange, which broke new ground."
Steve Matous, a mountain guide, former Access Fund executive director, and longtime climbing partner of Mark Udall, tells us: "Never good to be overdue this long but knowing Randy I am certain he could survive if there is nothing major wrong with him. I worked as a staff member on a winter Outward Bound course for him and know he has the strength and knowledge to do well under any circumstances. As far as his technical background, he was never a 'rock jock' but certainly was capable in fifth-class climbing and very used to traveling third class in the mountains where many others would be using a rope.
"I [saw] Leslie last October and know they kept up with their outdoor adventures over the years. All the Udall men have spent a fair amount of time traveling alone in the wilderness over the decades so I see this as neither unusual nor concerning except for the fact of being overdue."
Anyone who may have met or seen Randy Udall backpacking last week is asked to call (307)-367-2849. Anyone with backcountry experience who can join in the search, which comprises 225 square miles and begins at 10,000 feet, is asked to call Tip Top Search and Rescue at (307)-367-2849.


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Life at № 42 by E.M. Coutinho
"… Each country on the map is coloured according to the average score of test takers from that country. Redder countries show higher average bias, bluer countries show lower average bias, as the scale on the top of the map shows.Like a similar map which had been made for US states, our map shows variation in the extent of racial bias – but all European countries are racially biased when comparing blacks versus whites.
In every country in Europe, people are slower to associate blackness with positive words such as "good" or "nice" and faster to associate blackness with negative concepts such as "bad" or "evil". But they are quicker to make the link between blackness and negative concepts in the Czech Republic or Lithuania than they are in Slovenia, the UK or Ireland."
Full text: This map shows what white Europeans associate with race – and it makes for uncomfortable reading
This was from last year, but El Pais re-published a related story this week because of Salvini's rise in Italy; so I though it might be interesting to mention it here in case any of you missed the original.
Implicit bias is a fascinating thing because it's not based on rational thinking. I, for example, have to make a conscious effort not to be guided by the biases I absorbed as a child. As you can see from the map, my parts of the world lean to the redder end of the scale. This obviously extends to the derivative Latin American post-colonial cultures.
Consider unthinking actions like locking your car doors when someone approaches, feeling for your wallet to make sure it's still there – essentially how one instinctively assesses "risk". When I was little to keep me from wandering off my mother used to tell me that Gypsies stole children, and so if I wandered off they'd take me and I'd end up living in an encampment as a gypsy child. This created a mental imprint. So even if the rational me knows it's not true, when I see a gypsy I still make a negative association.
These associations extend into most aspects of being. In northeastern Brazil much of the culture is designed around reinforcing these biases. Straight hair is attractive whilst afro-textured hair is called duro (as in hard, difficult) A narrow nose is better than a wide one. A person who has fairer skin but frizzy hair or a wide nose was said to have a foot in the kitchen. In more explicit ways, it was said that blacks were hard workers as long as well supervised. This is why many kitchens in the old houses of Bahia had basculante windows near the ceiling, opened and closed with chains or ropes – so workers weren't distracted by things like a view or fresh air.
I was a little taken back when first living in Panama. The underlying theme of race is lighter skin is better. The cultural influence of European theme dominates tv shows, commercials, models, and newscasters was actually shocking to me. I expected a stronger Native presence but what I see is whites that speak Spanish. I was a tad disappointed that the darker skinned folks actually aspired to this as well.
You might find Harvard's Project Implicit interesting: https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/
French Americans make $.79 cents for every Russian American dollar earned. Clearly, the ethnic Russians must stand up and take responsibility for this intolerable prejudice. So much work ahead of us.
Where's the contrasting data and plot map submitted by 'darker' skin people in their word associations?
I'm trying to compare and contrast apples with apples.
All we have here is one side (asking whites about associations assigned to be indicative of positive and negative bias) being immediately used to try to suggest the disparity is caused by discrimination by whites. My point is that it is a fallacy to assume that unequal outcomes between two or more groups must be caused by discrimination and/or in this case bias. There are other possibilities, too. But nothing sells faster in the West than assigning white group guilt. Whatever happened to Buyer Beware?
As I've mentioned, I've heard things like that my entire life. In relation to gays, women and a number of other groups who suffer exclusion.
Why do gays need anti-discrimination policies based on their sexual orientation?
The answer is that when discrimination is based on variable X, it is precisely that X needs to be somehow protected. Saying that sexuality doesn't matter, for example, when it's THE factor that will allow a person to be ejected from a restaurant or even fired is incredibly dismissive and leaves people at the mercy of bigotry and exclusion.
You do not solve the problems of GroupThink by applying more GroupThink.
As we have both experienced life under Apartheid and witnessed what happens when the pendulum swings completely the other way in what has been labeled "reverse racism" I'd be interested to know what you consider would be the most equitable method/ solution to redressing the vast inequalities and major hurt that such institutionalized racism/bigotry causes?
I can tell you right now, if I were one of those who had been subject to such sever discrimination or bigotry, irrespective for what, I would want redress and a lot of compensation. And right now. Of that you can bet your arse!
Affirmative action and its equivalent actions for marginalized groups will inevitably produce a backlash.
This is the price that has to be paid for the hurt brought on by massive discrimination.
Eventually we will work out all these kinks (excuse the pun) and one can hope we swill treat each other with respect ( where it is deserved of course)
Meantime … as they say in the movies.
Suck it up!
I don't know, Ark, but arguing that is a good idea to visit the sins of the father to the third and fourth generations sounds eerily familiar to me and raises a red flag. Is this really a solution? Is it just?
The best redress I can imagine – told to me countless times and in so many ways – comes every November 11th here in Canada and is enunciated from coast to coast to coast: never again. Lest we forget, never again. This is a recurring and cohesive yet evolving tradition. It is a statement of common value and a demonstration of unity… from a very disparate population. You simply wouldn't believe the diversity operating side by side every day everywhere in peace, order, and (relatively) good government!
Let me explain what this Lest We Forget means because it's not obvious.
It's not war that is the problem: Canada goes to war when allies call and common cause is found. It's not taking up arms that is the problem; Canada has always produced very large volunteer armies yet the public outpouring of a debt owed is truly remarkable to behold: thousands upon thousands upon thousands of stark red and black poppies left at every cenotaph every year regardless of weather. It's not serving in uniform that is the problem; thousands of people today line the highway when a soldier's body is repatriated. It's not being killed that's the problem: hundreds of thousands will line the streets when a soldier is murdered by extremists. The problem – the ongoing problem – is to not forget what caused so many to have to take up arms.
This is the crux: we take up arms to defend the common values that unite each and every one of us into an improbably whole called Canada. Without those common values, there is no united country populated by vastly different peoples with different histories, cultures, languages, religions, dress, music, cuisine, race, gender, you name it. The common value that empowers tolerance and respect, demonstrated by celebrations of diversity, is that each person is equal under the law, people who share exactly the same legal rights, legal freedoms, legal responsibilities. These are the common values represented by the uniform that then represents each and every one of us. That soldier is me. That solider is you. These shared values are the pillars upon which the country stands or falls: tolerance and respect must stand or fall <ibecause of shared common values amidst tremendous diversity. And, rest assured, it's a very bloody evolution filled with injustices, to get to this point with unbelievable discrimination and intolerance having to be dismantled brick by brick by brick.
How do such atrocities arise? How does an apartheid system arise and how do we dismantle it?
Perhaps it was just coincidence that in same year I was spat upon by a white elderly woman for sitting on the park of a bench labeled 'Coloureds Only' in Durban South Africa, I was offered an ice cream by a nice elderly German Lady in the hot parking lot next to the infamous iron sign where gates once stood saying Arbeit macht frei. Both are excellent examples of man's inhumanity to man. A month later, the men in dark coats assigned to watch us looked embarrassed when we went into Lenin's tomb in red Square and embarrassed when a Russian engineering student was very excited to draw blueprints of our potato peeler. Even as a child I recognized what drove each to these terrible systems of injustice and discrimination: people chose to treat others either as the individuals they are or a representative of some hostile tribal group. These atrocities and the loss of freedom that accompany them are the result of group thinking taken to its logical conclusion. Us and Them. It doesn't build tolerance and respect; it annihilates it.
This is what we must never forget: turning real people, real individuals, into one of Them, people with different fundamental values,. is wrong. That is what produces injustice. The solution, therefore, is to always turn Them into Us, see the rights and freedoms and autonomy I demand for myself be reflected in how I treat you the individual. And that action multiplied throughout a vast population full of diversity is what then extends into systems and removes the old and replaces it with the new. Brick by brick. Assigning individuals to be members of groups that is one of Them is a guaranteed method of forgetting our shared value as individual humans. So that's why the November 11th tradition is so important: every person who values justice and liberty must be willing to do their part OR we will don the uniform to defend these essential uniting values.
And that's why this movement today to shuffle individuals and populations into hierarchical groupings in the name of justice is a move back into tribalism, and move back into division and competition and violence, a move back into destructive and dehumanizing systems like apartheid and genocide. It is exactly wrong at every turn and fails to learn from the worst expressions of our collective past. It is a guaranteed path to injustice and intolerance.
I know this sounds too philosophical to be of practical use… until you see it in action, feel it in action. That's why it's no surprise that Canada is having its problems with Saudi Arabia's government today and why Canada will not, cannot, back down. The government of Canada is expected to reflect Canadian values on the world stage and every politician here has seen what happens to governments that fail to stand up and act on these values: they are destroyed at the polls. I don't mean defeated; I mean taken down to almost zero support right across this huge country. Canadians take this shit very seriously.
Those who stand and act against this value of shared rights and freedoms have been fooled because their basic biology tells them its wrong in that it does not align with our innate sense of reciprocity and fairness in our social interactions with real people. And, like religion, believing in group hierarchies and who owes what to whom based on some historical tally is a pernicious ideology that fools so many people into believing groups are the same as the individuals who have been assigned to constitute them. That's an example of us forgetting what really matters: you… because you're me no matter what other differences you may represent.
Who's visiting the sins?
We afe redressing a situation that should not have happened in the first place. But it did, and thus we now have to face the problems created by others and sort it out as fast as possible.
Your view doesn't address the issues NOW.
It doesn't offer any sort of immediate payback for those marginalized or prevent people from continuing to behave in the same manner – legal restraints/prosecution not withstanding.
The situation in Canada would never have worked over here and you know this for a fact, not with the deep rooted racism.
To suggest otherwise is more than naive and thus to use Canada as a comparison is unfair.
Also, you have to instill the feeling of unity first and that is not going to happen unless those marginalized are allowed to be part of that unity and sometimes this requires laws to be put in place that accelerate this.
It all very well patting each other on the back and asking "All friends now, right?"
it is a process that has to be worked through.
But for those who still harbour ill feelings well … as Monty Python once remarked: "Tough titty for you fish face."
Well, follow the logic. Redress means compensation, figuring out who gets what and from whom. How much? In what form? For how long? Is there a cut off point? Do the Scots receive money from the English who receive money from the Danes who receive money from the northern Germans who receive money from the Italians who receive money from the Chinese? I mean, seriously, redress through reparations is hardly justice.
All I'm saying is that the only path forward that produces voluntary and popular peace, order, and good governance tolerant of diversity are fundamental Western values in law that make supreme individual autonomy. Enforce them.
Using the law to promote group identity – no matter how well intentioned the specific might be – is the way back into tribalism, intolerance, chaos, and reciprocal violence because one is actually implementing privilege based on group identity. That divides people by definition. It's just foolishness writ large.
The Windrush scandal in Britain was this year. So the idea we're talking about an isolated incident a few hundred years ago is facile.
Your proposition requires the enforcement of equal rights. That includes equal opportunities.
I am not disagreeing with this point.
But I do object a little that you are going from the sublime to the ridiculous and I doubt most people would expect such extremes in any case.
"Yeah, you better damn well give us back Manhattan, you bunch of frakking crooks!"
But simply saying "Yippee, democracy we can all be best buds" is not going to stop Mr Klu Klux Klan or Mr. Extreme "I hate faggots" from continuing to discriminate, if only tacitly, and thus, leaving an entire disenfranchised culture to its own devices and expecting them to simply "catch up" is simply callous.
Group identity is always there. and many people want to be part of a group and will fight tooth and nail to remain.
On the other hand, who could not think Manchester united supporters are nothing but ignorant cave dwellers?
If one has never been the subject of discrimination then it is simply far too easy to wield The Kiss and Make Up magic wand and expect everyone to be happy little sunbeams, no matter how reasonable the proposal might seem.
Sometimes the "other side" has to be allowed to do its "thing" and "we" simply have to bite the bullet.
Sublime to the ridiculous? NATO, NORAD, UN Peacekeeping, Irish peace accord, Iraq's Sunnis-Shia-Kurds power sharing arrangement? Are these results pie-in-the-sky? Dismantling apartheid? Is this a ridiculous undertaking? These are Canadian values in action. And it works.
Canadian foreign policy is expert at working within diversity to produce unity without demoting the importance of respecting very real differences. That's how lasting peace accords have to work. Have to.
Pointing at differences in group outcomes and crying 'There's discrimination!' is a guaranteed way of undermining tolerance and respect for diversity, undermining peace, undermining fairness. Using disparity between groups in whatever outcomes you want to measure is no way to eliminate discrimination but a way to maintain it, a way to promote it, a way to embed it in law. If you wish to address discrimination, then you must have a common goal and common ground that is equally fair to all.
Equity in outcome is not fair. This is where today's SJW's go so badly astray. They honestly believe equity in outcome by group identity addresses and corrects historical discrimination.
Sorry. That's wrong. Equity in outcomes attacks diversity. That won't work because there will always be differences in outcomes because the individuals who constitute any group are diverse. In all kinds of ways. And we have compelling historical evidence that such social engineering to impose equity fails to deliver peace, order, and good governance. It produces totalitarian states where the individual is remade into a cog of the state. No differences between cogs (although there will always be some cogs that are more equal than others, to paraphrase Orwell). That's what comes from championing equity of outcomes. Read 1984.
Equality in law for every individual is the value that works to allow diversity to thrive. That's why representatives of groups who wish to establish privilege target equality in law first. That's the lynch pin that denies legal discrimination. And it is under attack relentlessly. That is what must be guarded at all costs because that is the rock upon which individual diversity stands or falls. You can be as different as you want as long as you offer the same to everyone else AND the exercise of your differences does not infringe on the rights of anyone else wishing to exercise their differences.
This is not some pie-in-the-sky notion but the basis for addressing real world solutions to long standing infringements on the rights of others. And it's one of the very few solutions that does work. That's why it's important.
Eliminating discrimination is not an event but a process, a process that requires certain building blocks, primary among them a legal undertaking first that elevates the individual to be supreme, This has to be followed up by its uniform enforcement. This requires diligence and maintenance if the process is to be peaceful and long lasting. The legal undertaking must start by create a legal common value important for each and every citizen to selfishly uphold.
Look, discrimination does exist. It's inevitable but can be controlled. What I'm saying is that reducing it between people, dismantling it from systems and institutions, requires something more than creating new victims. What I'm saying is that assigning discrimination to be the cause of disparity between groups (very often twinned to the belief that disparity indicates discrimination) is an assumption that is dead wrong. Disparity indicates differences. Differences are fundamental to diversity. Seeking equity in law to address discrimination attacks equality in law and produces legal discrimination based on group identity.
"assigning discrimination to be the cause of disparity between groups (very often twinned to the belief that disparity indicates discrimination) is an assumption that is dead wrong."
That's a spectacularly narrow reading. I pointed you to cases with verifiable evidence where discrimination led to less acceptance of women at medical school. Where people with Maghrebi names don't get to even look at rental apartments. I can also point you to a studies where French men with the same cv as French women get more responses from employers and so forth.
The reason the Canadian model worked in Canada is there was the pre-condition that there was general agreement discrimination is wrong. There's wide opposition to that as a pre-condition in most of the world. Which is why counter-measures have been adopted.
"The reason the Canadian model worked in Canada is there was the pre-condition that there was general agreement discrimination is wrong."
No. That's myth-making and exactly opposite to the truth.
Canada emerged from exactly what you claim is wide opposition to that. Every typical discrimination has been part of our historical roots. That's why 'emerged from' is key. It is from widespread discrimination that common value has now been implemented and this is what Canada exports to the world: the means by which discrimination can be overcome because our bloody and very discriminatory history has emerged into today's peace, order, and good governance. It is the 'how' that I'm trying to articulate, the very practical order by which discrimination can be effectively addressed and corrections can be implemented while, at the same time, diversity can be celebrated by all.
If reducing discrimination is the goal, then empowering group identity in place of individual autonomy in law is exactly the wrong way to achieve this desired result.
Are you seriously comparing Canadian history and social oppression with French or English? Or Spanish, or Portuguese, or German?
Canada is founded on importing all kinds of 'social oppression' from Europe in the attitudes and behaviours and practices of the immigrants themselves. Add the First Nations component and ancient treaties into the mix as well as raw geography and competing economic concerns. Now here's the thing: you try creating peaceful and prosperous communities populated by various percentages of English, French, Catholic, Protestant, German, Jewish, Basque, Spanish, Portuguese, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, evangelical, daoist, Sikh, Italian, Somalian, Ethiopian, Tamil, Indian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese… together with nearly 600 culturally distinct indigenous tribes, add a mixture of Marxist, Socialist, Liberal, Libertarian, Fascist, and Conservative ideologies into the political arena and tell me about how trying to rank group rights and group identities into a hierarchy for legal status reduces rather than expands and institutionalizes 'social oppression' in actual communities.
And yet, this is the reality of Canada.
Don't you think the model has something to offer all these 'homelands' that continue to experience ongoing, disruptive, and violent 'social oppression' and active legal discrimination against minorities and majorities? Or is the model still too pie-in-the-sky… in spite of real world evidence to the contrary when applied to, say, The Troubles and results in the longest peace accord in Irish history, that brings Kurds and Shias and Sunnis to the same governing table? Don't you think the Canadian model that has emerged from all these inherent problems as well as institutionalized discrimination can be useful informing today's social ideology?
I think Canada's history is very unique – and that a very particular set of circumstances made for what exists today.
Meanwhile the Catholic church still has enough power in Argentina to stop senators passing abortion legislation that's supported by not just the majority of citizens, but also the majority of congress members and even the president.
I think the Canadian model only exists in Canada for the same reason the Scandinavian model only exists in Scandinavia. The forces that oppose equality of rights are strong enough to stop equivalents of the Canadian Human Rights Act ever becoming law. Discord and fear is what keeps whole classes of politicians relevant and in power.
I can tell you that just 20 years ago, so long after apartheid in SA ended, there was huge uproar in Brazil because a white man was going to kiss a black woman (Zezé Motta) on national television. So the idea of a level playing field through equality laws alone doesn't really come close to addressing any of that.
Of course not, but it has to start somewhere.
Once upon a time everyone smoked. It was the norm. Now, not so much. Maybe in 50 years time no one will smoke?
As Warren Beatty once remarked:
"The best way to get rid of racism is for everyone to fuck everyone else until we are all brown."
Or something along those lines.
We'll get there …. eventually
Reblogged this on The Secular Jurist and commented:
The geography of this map is intriguing and warrants further examination. More racially biased countries are in the east and south of Europe with the Balkans standing out as a regional exception. That is somewhat surprising considering the ethnic tensions which have plagued the Balkans for centuries. Regarding the east-south bias, is it attributable to lower economic and educational conditions than the west-north; or, is it attributable to cultural differences?
Indeed, there are some interesting questions relating to that map. In Southern Europe (as you already know) we have a well established sociocultural pattern of Catholic authoritarianism; Salazar, Franco, Mussolini. Deeply entrenched patriarchy. All of this together could be interpreted simply as male reproductive strategy, and part of that strategy is keeping out anything "foreign".
There was still a 'White Australia' policy when we first arrived, so my vaguely 'asian' eyes caused me to be bullied in the schoolyard at age 5-6. That left me with a strong bias /towards/ Asians. I guess it was a kind of 'FU' reaction.
I'd hate to think I was racist, and yet…seeing women in hijabs and burkhas still makes me angry. Is there such a thing as feminine racism? I've read enough about Islam and Muslim women to know that for most, wearing the hijab etc is a personal choice. So my head knows I shouldn't be angry. My heart though…I guess I see it as a backward step in the faltering march towards true equality. 😦
@Tildeb You're right, racism is not restricted to white males. Japan is possibly the most racist country on earth, and every country has its own version of 'the Outsider' or 'the Other'. The point, though, is that in those European countries, the balance of /power/ is in the hands of white, predominantly old, males [except for Angela Merkel]. No discussion about race can overlook the direction from which power comes.
That's the bullshit ctrl Left ideology speaking. Power imbalances and assuming disparity from that because of discrimination. Is that really true?
Well, it may be autism speaking here, but I'm actually very concerned with what's true.
Look, here's the thing: ask yourself why does diversity matter? In a uniculture, there's no appreciable diversity, no reason to really think much about differences in culture. I'll bet we can find all kinds of agreement about how diversity enriches populations and that it's a Good Thing. All kinds of value added as well as stresses and various leanings towards bigotry. But then ask yourself about the value of different cultures and how that informs diversity. Now (to borrow this thought from a Big Brained person), let's get this point straight: what is 'it' when we're talking about diversity? Well, if culture matters enormously, and cultures differ from one another, then differences between cultures matter enormously. Isn't that what diversity means?
So, is it 'discrimination' to find that, say, Caribbean blacks earn slightly more than whites in the US? The mantra we are told to assume is that power causes imbalances that create 'victims' and so the reason why we should implement racial profiling of students is to empower African Americans to gain more access. Sounds good, eh? Who cares that the model fails to explain why Caribbean blacks earn more than those other 'dark skinned' victims? Are we to assume they have 'discriminated' against African Americans? And what about the racial bias actually exercised by well-meaning Leftists who think holding Asians to a much higher SAT score is somehow addressing institutionalized racial discrimination?!
You see the problem? It lies with the assumption that there really, really, really is disparity because of ongoing racial discrimination. But what about those who come from cultures that do not share, say, a high degree of value on academic achievement? How on earth is that the fault of those who do and, more importantly, how does applying racial policies on behalf of 'victims' reduce racial discrimination in practice?
It ludicrous. But this IS the ctrl Left ideology in practice and it is ludicrous when it is used as a basis for enacting public policies like addressing racial bias by endorsing racial public policies.
You seem to be stuck in a thought pattern that doesn't quite make sense.
Nearly 20 years ago when I finished school I was offered a job at a very important and well known company. A major player in the art world. With the offer there was a "warning" that I would be expected to keep my sexual orientation a private matter. That sort of thing actively pushed, for much of history, gay men into the shadows. The ones who were obviously gay were relegated a handful of professions which weren't dominated by male heterosexual standards. That was very much still the case in my childhood. Openly gay men were – in order of the social class they were born to: hairdressers, florists, shop owners, members of the art world or professors. There was also a pocket in the field of entertainment. Some were very successful in those fields. The argument you seem to be making is that because that sliver of success exists, the status quo should be maintained and nothing needs to be done to stop discrimination in other professions.
Adding discriminatory polices to reduce discriminatory polices seems to me to be rather counterproductive. I would even go so far as to call it ludicrous. Bringing up examples of discrimination as if this somehow addresses the ludicrous and makes it seem reasonably coherent is like the Rain Dancer pointing at examples of water as if these examples make the rain dancing magic reasonably coherent.
What I'm criticizing specifically is this idea – this fundamental and core belief that informs the basis of today's illiberal liberals and the Marxist ideology being furthered – is that unequal outcomes between two or more groups is caused by discrimination. This is an assumption that is wrong, that supporters of diversity should know is wrong – flat out idiocy – a fallacy in action, a self-defeating ideology that only destroys and never, ever builds solutions to real problems faced by real people in real life.
As I said before, you're fixated on a very narrow area and so you can't see the forest for the trees.
I'm bringing up discrimination so we can discuss how to bring about non-discrimination. What do you suggest is the best path?
To understand what's true first, and then base public policies on the most meritorious approach. How racist, eh?
The disparity assumption – to indicate a power imbalance that causes discrimination – is a fallacy. That's why I referenced something that's true, that French Americans really do make $.79 for ever $1.00 Russian Americans make, to show you that the assumption to demand redress from the selected target is not just illiberal but goes against the very fabric of due process, against the need to produce compelling evidence to link a selected cause with selected effects.
The reasoning is identical. But it's ludicrous when put into public policy nevertheless… in the name of, well who really cares as long as it sounds good. Let's call it 'restorative justice'. Doesn't that sound great? So very liberal-ish sounding. Who's against restorative justice? The heathen! Shut up and go away, those foes of justice!
You can't just skip this evidence link requirement in the pursuit of 'justice' without completely abandoning the core values that allow justice to occur. This is why the ideology of painting disparity to be caused by oppressors on the oppressed is not only ethically rotten to the core but anti-truth and very much anti-liberal. It's like the worst kind of religion in the sense that the believers in the assumption hold it as a matter of faith immune from evidence by people who will not tolerate correction, will cast aside what's true for what they believe to be true, who raise their handy dandy terms of the liberal enlightenment thinkers and pervert these values by inversion, to be the opposite of what they really mean, by those who see no problem pretending it's reasonable that discrimination is best addressed by intentionally discriminating, that free speech is best protected by implementing hate laws to stop people from speaking freely, to censor and disinvite and deplatform people who find issue with the assumption, or, if these moves fail to achieve the silence they demand of the ideology they feel they morally must uphold against enemies foreign and domestic, they feel entitled to shout down and drown out and attack and burn and use violence against those who dare say what's being said, to go after people's livelihoods and get them fired, to advocate for the removal of these people from the public domain by character assassination, to use every tool of vilification available at their disposal to socially and professionally try to have them condemned, people who gleefully will justify those who do the same to anyone who not just dares speak truth to power but go after anyone who thinks they should even be heard. These are reprehensible, deplorable tactics used by those who pretend to champion 'victims' and the 'oppressed' by making victims and doing their damnedest to oppress.
It's the same broken thinking, the same charade, based on the same use of unassailable assumptions that any faith-based movement requires: that the assumption is above reproach and certain in accuracy… no matter what reality has to say in the matter.
That's why I keep saying it's time for all of us to wake the fuck up.
Again you're focusing on a single aspect – which in turn means you're not seeing the problem as a whole.
Non-discrimination is hardly a question of merit alone. Are you seriously implying that's the case?
Merit of being stopped and searched by police? Merit of having to hide one's sexual orientation? Merit of not getting to rent an apartment because of ethnicity? Merit of being denied a place in medical school because of gender?
By looking at just one angle you're failing to see these are all serious problems people confront every single day.
The Rain Dancer says the critic is not looking at the bigger picture, that doubting the narrative and asking for evidence between the selected effects and the supposed cause is too narrow. Look at this puddle, RD says! Look at this creek! See that river over there? And clouds. You are denying clouds, refusing to understand the nuances of humidity and temperature.
Your criticism isn't based on evidence.
And there lies the problem. Your narrative presumes discrimination is a myth – yet all the evidence points in the opposite direction. All the evidence points to certain groups having advantages in a systematic way.
When large groups of people are barred from education and marginalised in employment, as has been the case for women, certain racial groups and LGBT people – this creates a dynamic of 2nd class citizenship.
If your theory was plausible, you'd be able to prove it quite easily with verifiable evidence. All you have to do is demonstrate how the people who control the rules of society are there by merit alone. You can start by explaining the case of the Tokyo Medical School:
" Your narrative presumes discrimination is a myth."
No, it doesn't. Discrimination is very real. Institutional racism is very real. I lived in apartheid South Africa. I've been to Auschwitz. These are very real manifestations of what happens when we grant meaning to group identity, when we get the order wrong about what describes whom: the group identifies the individual or the individual describes the group.
"All the evidence points to certain groups having advantages in a systematic way."
Yes, and that is never, ever going to change when you empower GroupThink. But you ARE empowering GroupThink by assuming group disparity is caused by group discrimination. You continue to not see this clearly. You do not solve the problems of GroupThink by applying more GroupThink.
At its core, systems are empowered by real people in real life, by how they act individually. People empower systems. Individuals. They act on their beliefs. This is where meaningful change has to occur to reduce systemic racism: to go after the beliefs that empower systemic racism. At the level of the individual. You. Me. That's how 'systems' change.
This only comes about when each of us does not allow the ideology of Us and Them – the heart and soul of GroupThink – to start the process of rationalizing privilege in law, rationalizing different treatment of individuals based on group membership. This framing is diametrically opposed to achieving individual equality in action and is the root cause of maintaining group bias and discrimination.
Believing in GroupThink causes group discrimination in practice because it justifies it! That's what you're doing, albeit in reverse!! Your intentions don't make your GroupThink support any less discriminatory!!!
We do our individual part by elevating the principles of individual equality to be our guide on how we act individually. Each of us is the Other, and each of us sees the identical rights and freedoms we wish for ourselves to be recognized and acted upon in and by the Other. That's how Them becomes Us, You becomes Me in how we interact on an individual basis. It's the Golden rule in action, the fundamental moral principles of reciprocity and fairness in action. Respect the individual and stop empowering GroupThink.
We can be different in many ways (and celebrate these important differences) but share the identical rights and freedoms and responsibilities that creates the Us. This is what equality in law means, equality in action means. We stop supporting systemic advantages based on group memberships and start exercising our individual and principled actions towards other individuals, not by group membership (the colour of their skin) but by individual actions (the quality of their character). This is how we put a stop to systemic advantages: first, by refusing to go along with GroupThink, and secondly stop pointing at groups and empowering belief that these differences define the individuals within the category. This is exactly how systemic advantages are empowered, explain how an apartheid system arises, how concentration camps and dehumanization is sustained. Group thinking is anathema to me seeing myself in you, a division that will never, ever allow the Other to become Us.
As a theory all of that looks very good and perfectly reasonable – but what happens when we examine cases like the necessity of the 14th amendment despite everything in it already being implied in the bill of rights? Or similarly the Déclaration des droits de l'homme, where it turned out homme was read literally and women weren't included in the new rights.
I can see the system you propose working if it comes with safeguards with bite. And some serious anti-discrimination enforcement measures. We're far from being in that position in France. Spain is even worse.
Always hold to the principle and let it become an honest value upon which your actions can be judged. Let it guide you. Teach children to hold to the principle and demonstrate its value in promoting reciprocity and fairness. That's how integrity is born and sustained.
Look at how powerful this is in action where Saudi Arabia is scrambling to 'punish' Canada for standing on principle and criticizing the injustice of the barbarism that is the Saudi government and legal system, used to bludgeon real social justice warriors within its borders while losing respect each and every day in global community of nations. Support for the federal government taking this principled stand is ubiquitous across this massively diverse and multi-cultural country. Look at how populations throughout the West castigate their cowardly governments for not standing arm in arm on this principle as Canada does.
Only individual autonomy respected in law allows an honest response to these gross violations of fairness and reciprocity – the two pillars which are the fundamental principles of morality. Individual autonomy in law is not a group principle but an individual aspect each and every one of us desires and so morality belongs to the actions undertaken by each and every one of us regardless of any other group identity we may choose to hold. Such identity is secondary to our own unique character and we should put this understanding into action whenever we see real injustice carried out against real people in real life and not substitute this group identity hierarchy and think we can succeed at producing justice. We will produce injustice every time we forget upholding the principle foremost.
Okay, you lost me almost from the first word, and you've brought in all sorts of 'examples' that have no meaning for me.
I know nothing about 'Caribbean Blacks' vs any other kind of black because…I'm not American.
So, I'm different to you. My culture is different to yours. My reality is different to yours because the values of my culture are different to the values of your culture. In Australia, the values that you assign to ctrl Left are actually widely accepted and pretty mainstream. Not radical at all.
Yet you assume that whatever is 'true' in your world/country/culture is necessarily true for all countries/cultures. They're not, and I could go into a great philosophical debate as to whether there is such a thing as objective 'Truth' at all. But I won't.
Instead, I'll say that diversity, in the form of a multicultural policy, is a relatively new thing in Australia – from the 1970's or thereabouts. But it works and has allowed this country to go from core racist 'White Australia' to core multicultural, multi-race Australia in under 50 years.
The benefits of this 'diversity' have been enormous, enriching /our/ lives in everything from food and fashion to technology. And yes, our little country of 25 million actually punches above its weight in terms of innovation.
But even if you disagree with the cultural value of diversity, there is an evolutionary value that no one can ignore – monocultures go extinct because they are incapable of changing fast enough to keep up with a changing environment. By monocultures I mean the biological definition – a whole ecosystem supporting just one or two types of organisms.
Diverse populations, however, can change and evolve much faster. I can give you chapter and verse of how and why this happens. Just say the word.
So, in answer to why diversity matters, I'll just say that it doesn't matter…if you're happy for your species/race to go extinct or become so irrelevant that it shrinks to a tiny population in a tiny corner of the ecosystem.
I want my country to remain relevant in the Asia Pacific area, so I want it to continue changing and becoming more diverse. Luckily, so do most other Australians.
Acflory, I said, " I'll bet we can find all kinds of agreement about how diversity enriches populations and that it's a Good Thing."
Translation: I agree diversity is a Good Thing.
But I also point out what diversity means. Differences. In multi-cultural diversity, we're talking differences. What does that mean? Well, there are understandably going to be differences between two or more groups. After all, there HAS TO BE! That's what diversity depends on: differences.
Oh look: the underlying assumption I criticize has to do with viewing cultural differences as disparity in outcomes (choose whatever outcome you want). The assumption is that these differences reveal disparity and that disparity is CAUSED by discrimination.
That's the bullshit.
You cannot have the notion that diversity is of value while decrying disparity as the result of discrimination. These two do not go together. That's the perversion of any and all data about differences – especially cultural differences – by those who foolishly utilize the post modern ideology of framing the world as oppressors and the oppressed, victimizers and victims. It's turtles all the way down because these differences actually matter in producing differences in outcomes. Heresy! Not discrimination. Cultural differences because of values.
That's the conversation that is simply intolerable to the SJWs of this world because we cannot possibly judge outcomes based on values without being automatically labeled as bigots, misogynists, and racists, you see. Heads I win, tails you lose. That's the ctrl Left in action and it is deeply anti-liberal, deeply anti-enlightenment values. It's actually fascist.
You're absurdly conflating diversity with "outcomes" and leaving out inequality of opportunities.
I presume you read French, so have a look at this: https://www.20minutes.fr/societe/2188739-20171215-mieux-vaut-avoir-nom-francais-maghrebin-louer-logement-selon-etude
'You cannot have the notion that diversity is of value while decrying disparity as the result of discrimination. '
I must be tired. No matter how many times I re-read that sentence, I still have no idea what it means.
Are you trying to say that the only way to have diversity is to have one group more powerful than the other? Or are you implying that difference itself creates disparity?
Either way, I don't see the logic. Sorry.
I admit that the competition model is powerful, but in the animal world, competition is balanced by co-operation. And the same is true of human populations. We simply could not survive as a society if the two did not go hand in hand.
Okay, let's come at this a slightly different way.
You and I are different people, different in many ways. I'm saying that's good. It's good that we're different. You have strengths and weakness, abilities and foibles as do I. We share that fact that we are different. I believe we can celebrate these differences because they add value to the other, by allowing your strengths and abilities to compensate for my weaknesses and my foibles. And the reverse is true. I can enjoy your successes, your achievements, as you can mine. We are complete individuals with both differences and similarities. But without question we are both individuals. That's our fundamental similarity. And this is what I'm saying the law should also recognize, that we share fundamental rights and freedoms and responsibilities, a core set of values that grants you the same opportunities that I wish for myself. And the opposite, that you grant me the same opportunities that you wish for yourself. Individual equality in law to grant each of us maximum latitude to develop as we choose. Legal equality.
So far, so good?
Now, along comes the ideology that our differences are not a result of our individual uniqueness (when spread across some imported group boundary to create a population for that group identity) but are a product of group membership, a membership that shapes our rights and freedoms and responsibilities and opportunities. The ideology tells us that we can know about ourselves by means of identifying which groups we are members of. Group identity. And the measurement of what opportunities each group has is based on comparing outcomes by group affiliation, by plotting where on a hierarchy our group currently resides… above this one but below that one. Furthermore, the assumption is that we can know the positioning of our group in a hierarchy of groups based on these different outcomes, that the outcomes define the pecking order of group power and privilege. This ideology advocates for group equality in law to grant every group maximum latitude to achieve sameness in outcome. Legal equity.
Note the two terms: equality in law is about shared individual rights whereas equity in law is about a result in the sameness of outcomes.
When I say, "You cannot have the notion that diversity is of value while decrying disparity as the result of discrimination", I am pointing out the inherent friction in the group-based ideology that tries to have its cake and eat it too, that tries to argue that equality of diversity between people is of value when such diversity is then used as an indication of a lack of equity that must be corrected.
You seem to be making distinctions based on dubious legal definitions. The purpose of The Law is not justice, for either individuals or groups. The Law is simply there to make living in a group – i.e. a society – possible.
In so far as the Law is 'supposed' to apply to everyone, I guess you could call it egalitarian, but again, equality is not the purpose of The Law. It is simply a tool.
The reality of Western society is that we either demand equality, or we don't.
If we do, we may get The Law changed to more closely resemble the model of equality we ask for.
If we don't ask, the Law retains the form it has held since the last group 'asked' loudly enough to trigger change.
In the real world, the Western world, the group that has historically 'asked' loud enough to be heard, has always comprised wealthy, middle-aged white men.
Thus the Law that you reference was specifically designed to benefit this one group. It /still/ largely benefits this one group to the exclusion of all other groups.
As a member of a group that comprises 51% of the world's population, but is not equal to your 'group', I don't want to bump your group off. I don't want my group to become the 'alpha' group. I simply want to be valued for the very things that make me different to you. If males are more competitive, females are more co-operative.
To survive long term, humans need those opposites to be in balance, as they are in nature.
Trying to defend some silly right wing bias using emotive, perjorative /language/ is counter survival. Trying to justify said bias using a mish-mash of quasi logical arguments is also counter survival.
Diversity will win out because it is the only mechanism that will guarantee the survival of the human race. As such, your arguments have simply served to crystalise, in my own mind, why I place such great value on diversity.
Thanks for that. 🙂
I think you're coming from the perspective of the Canadian Human Rights Act, which as I understand it, works very efficiently. You're also part of a culture which is essentially courteous.
I say that because we had a Canadian neighbour in Spain who constantly told us the way people interacted there was brutal. She pulled me aside once to tell me that I shouldn't call someone who did odd jobs for us "Polish" – that instead I should call him by his name. But the identitarian dynamic is deeply ingrained in the culture. So your system can only really become possible in an international sense when something like the CHRA becomes part of the population's mindset.
-grin- Apologies, clearly I didn't make my point obvious enough. Your comments about diversity and the left wing are the /bias/. Equality under law is the fantasy.
I'm not interested in debating how things should be. I'm interested in how things are.
In so far as the US is part of the Western reality, I'm interested in the US. Mostly though, I'm interested in the parts of the Western reality for which I feel a greater affinity – i.e. Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the UK, Continental Europe and the emerging power houses of Asia. It's a big world out there, and it's changing the lived reality for all of us.
That's a fantastic example: "hay que mejorar la raza". It's in the depths of the Spanish psyche, especially from the colonial period when there were castes. Have you ever seen the Casta paintings?
The best position was a Spaniard born in continental Spain. The worst I think was African Black.
When I was in Brazil, I once had a stylist ask me if I was sure I didn't have a little 'raca' in me because of my curly hair, thus making 'race' mean 'African'. Whiteness was so normal to her that it didn't even count as a difference. And sort of half-joking in that way that people have when they think they're being outrageous, as if I would be shocked at the implication that I might not be a pure non-Mediterranean European.
I think you're right. I also think that people have to be trained to consider their own ethnocentricities, and most people don't hear that lesson.
This is the danger that ensues when one assumes that disparity of outcomes between groups of people is due to or proves group discrimination. Believing in this fallacy – for that is what it is, a thinking error – replaces the locus of moral responsibility from the individual who acts in a discriminatory way to the group to which he or she has been assigned. This is how a victimhood culture is created and it is the polar opposite to seeking reduced discrimination and/or legal equality for all individuals. ("In a victimhood culture it's identity as a victim that gives you status. It's not your own virtue at all, but someone else's treatment of you, that makes you virtuous."). This is the black heart of identity politics in action – morally irresponsible and intentionally discriminatory – and it is rotten to the core because it creates a separation between real people in real life and their value as the individuals they are. It rips away individual autonomy – the quality of one's character – and replaces it with group identity.
From the authors of Understanding Victimhood Culture about this ideology being being supported and empowered on university campuses and played out in antifa activities in the US:
"So the moral hierarchy of victimhood culture places entire groups of people at the top or bottom based on the whole group's victimhood status. And while it's not always clear which groups qualify, Jonathan Haidt identifies seven groups that are currently treated as sacred: people of colour, women, LGBTs, Latinos, Native Americans, people with disabilities, and Muslims. Under this schema even many minority groups, such as Evangelical Christians, fail to qualify, and any discrimination against them is ignored or celebrated.
We have two problems with this. The first is a fundamental moral objection. We believe in the ideals of dignity culture — that all human beings have an inherent worth and should be treated accordingly — and we object to the new hierarchy of victimhood just as we would any racial and ethnic hierarchy. The second problem is the reactions it may produce. Whites, men, and others who do not have victimhood status are unlikely to accept a new morality and a new moral hierarchy in which they're at the bottom. And they may end up embracing one in which they're at the top. We find the recent prominence of alt-right white nationalists alarming, and we worry there will be more of it in reaction to the spread of victimhood culture. It's a dangerous thing to undermine dignity culture and its ideals of equality."
It's a dangerous ideology and it guarantees more not less discrimination. Believing that this group identity culture will magically rectify real discrimination by discriminating is truly and profoundly idiotic.
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